Inconsistent regulations behind large numbers of non-Estonian speaking taxi drivers

Due to inconsistencies in enforcing Estonian language requirements for taxi drivers, the situation varies across municipalities: while Tallinn calls service card applicants for an interview, many municipalities issue permits without verifying language skills.
The Language Inspectorate criticizes this practice, yet the Ministry of Education, which is preparing amendments to the Language Act, does not view it as a widespread concern.
In Tallinn, taxi app passengers have reported often encountering drivers who have insufficient or no knowledge of Estonian, with some unable to communicate even in two relatively widely spoken foreign languages, namely English and Russian, either.
Local governments issue taxi driver permits, and it is mandatory to hold one of these to work in the sector.
In Tallinn, by far the largest municipality, there is a local Municipal Police force (Mupo), which is responsible for issuing taxi driver permits.
Mupo first verifies an applicant's details and then conducts background checks, including those on the applicant's criminal record, as per the Public Transport Act.
Kristjan Haljasoks, senior specialist at Mupo's registry department, told ERR."Since certain penalties recorded in the criminal register can disqualify an applicant, we first check the applicant's background. If there are any issues, we contact that applicant, to discuss the details."
Although the Public Transport Act does not have any language proficiency requirements, Mupo follows a regulation based on the Language Act, which requires public transport drivers to have Estonian to at least B1 level," he went on.
"Since only the Language Inspectorate has the right to actually request a B1 certificate, Mupo bases its decisions on the ability of the applicant to converse and answer simple questions, during an interview. If the applicant cannot comprehend the conversation and respond in Estonian, we will then refuse to issue a permit, citing the Language Act," Haljasoks added.
However, other municipalities also distribute permits, while their requirements are not as stringent as those in Tallinn, as the Public Transport Law does not oblige them to make it so.
This means that some taxi drivers obtain their permits from other municipalities, including those immediately next door to the capital.
Drivers in Tallinn have reportedly mentioned Maardu and Keila as easier locations to obtain a permit.
"The reason is that the Public Transport Law, which we follow, does not stipulate a language requirement, so there is no actual need to enforce it, so it is likely unenforced elsewhere," Haljasoks conceded.
In the past, the North-Estonia Public Transport Center (Põhja-Eesti Ühistranspordikeskus) issued service cards in Maardu, just east of Tallinn, without verifying language skills.
However, the Maardu city government has taken on the issuing of taxi driver permits and has pledged to start paying attention to the language proficiency of applicants
One expat source whose name is known to the editorial team and wished to remain anonymous shared their experience with ERR, and claimed it was a Bolt representative themselves who suggested applying for a permit from a municipality outside Tallinn, due to difficulties with the Estonian language.
Oscar Rõõm, head of Bolt's ride service, rejected this charge. "Bolt never advises applying for a card from a specific municipality," he told ERR.
Rõõm stressed the importance for Bolt that customers receive quality service in their preferred language, and that drivers comply with all legal requirements. Bolt says it also supports language training, by offering Estonian language learning options to drivers.
Rõõm said: "Additionally, our app facilitates communication between client and driver in various languages using an automatic translation feature. We are also actively working on new solutions to improve Estonian language proficiency, which we plan to implement soon."
Language Inspectorate says its hands are tied
The requirement for taxi drivers to prove their knowledge of Estonian was struck off the Public Transport Law in 2016.
According to Ilmar Tomusk, Language Inspectorate director, this does not mean taxi drivers have no need to understand Estonian, as the Language Act mandates public transport drivers to have Estonian to at least a B1 level, including taxi drivers.
This level, the same as that required when applying for Estonian citizenship, is also the most widely seen in the job market in any case, and signals that the individual can manage simple everyday tasks in Estonian.
The Language Inspectorate can only check a taxi driver's language skills if a complaint has been filed. Where there is also information about the vehicle's registration number or the driver's name, the Language Inspectorate can request Mupo assistance in summoning that driver for a language check.
Unfortunately, some drivers who have been summoned do not attend interview, while there is no means of compelling them to attend.
Even if a driver does show up, the Language Inspectorate can only issue a directive and summon them again for a check a year down the line, but cannot impose fines or initiate proceedings which would annul their permit.
As a result, a driver with poor Estonian language skills can continue driving taxis in any case; many foreign drivers may have already left the country by the time they are due for their next language check a year later, ERR reports.
Tomusk noted that removing the language requirement for taxi drivers is not a good look from a regulatory perspective, as it leads to the situation whereby the state issues permits with the one hand but tries to identify non-Estonian speakers via supervision with the other hand, which Tomusk said is ineffective.
A Language Inspectorate official accompanies Mupo on spot-checks a few times per month, and this has led to more drivers with language difficulties being summoned this year than was previously the case.
The Language Inspectorate says it gets about 50 complaints a year concerning taxi drivers' lack of Estonian language skills, with proceedings initiated against around 20 of these.
A little more than a third of the way through 2024, however, that figure of 20 drivers with proceedings to their name has already been reached.
According to Tomusk, collaboration with Mupo has yielded better results, but the state should do more.
He said: "One issue with Bolt drivers is that they often claim it was a one-off trip. The driver argues that they had neither driven before nor after the ride that ended up with the complaint. It is not viable for us to verify whether this was actually the case, or not."
The Language Inspectorate says the sector needs more precise regulation, but the entire issue of platform work is so complex and politically charged, that addressing it often proves difficult.
Tomusk said: "We think that from a client's' perspective, it would make the most sense to reinstate the language requirement in section 57 of the Public Transport Act," noting that this proposal was considered two years ago but did not meet political consensus.
Ministry: Complaints are few and far between
The Ministry of Education and Research has been reviewing the provisions of the Language Law for some time and says it has plans to send the proposed amendments to their coordination round with stakeholders, at the end of this month.
Kätlin Kõverik, the ministry's language policy department lead expert, said that their analysis of the taxi driver and ride-sharing driver issue demonstrates that the number of complaints about the lack of Estonian language skills is small when compared with the amount such services are used.
For instance, Bolt reported that complaints about the lack of Estonian language skills from drivers using its platform constitute about 0.2 percent of the total.
The Language Inspectorate says it gets about 20-25 complaints annually about Bolt taxi drivers' lack of Estonian language skills.
Kõverik noted that in commerce, the number of complaints about the same issue is four to five times higher.
She said: "We have met with representatives of the sector in the course of our analysis, and a program is underway to improve the language skills of taxi drivers. Today's drivers hold a permit, which assumes B1 level Estonian language skills."
"It is important to develop cooperation with service providers in order to ensure that drivers can communicate at the necessary level and, where necessary, enhance supervision. Whether any regulatory changes will be made and what form these may take is still under discussion," Kõverik went on.
Commenting on the relatively low number of complaints, Ilmar Tomusk at the Language Inspectorate said that complaints only make up a small proportion of the total number of bad experiences, and that in fact the majority of customers do not make a formal complaint.
He said: "It is likely that the problem is much larger than the number of complaints we receive would indicate."
The policy requiring taxi drivers to prove their language proficiency only after a client's complaint is therefore not effective he added.
"If we have three local languages in Tallinn: Estonian, Russian, and English, but we have a taxi driver who doesn't speak any of these, they then cannot, for instance, call the emergency services, or understand information signs about detours or changes in traffic management," he enumerated as potential risks.
Tomusk added that while it is a positive thing that someone who is in Estonia temporarily can easily earn a living by driving a taxi, this comes at the expense of consumer rights, so a middle ground ensuring client safety needs to be found, he said.
Isamaa's Riigikogu faction initiated a bill in March of this year to amend the Language Act and the Public Transport Act, among other legislation, to set language requirements for platform workers and to make sufficient knowledge of the national language a prerequisite for obtaining a taxi driver's permit.
However, the government decided not to move forward with that bill, at the end of April.
Education Minister Kristina Kallas (Eesti 200) explained in a letter dated April 26, to the Riigikogu's Culture Committee, that changing the Language Act requires a more thorough analysis, in order to consider different options for addressing obstacles.
She noted that since a proposal for amending the Language Act is already under preparation with the Ministry of Education and Research, it is not practical to make piecemeal legislative amendments before this is done.
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Editor: Andrew Whyte